I want to begin my modding adventures by making Breezehome into something I prefer...is it advisable to wait until I have purchased it in game with the rooms etc...or can I begin modifying with just the basic house purchase arrangement?

In other words will I screw something up by modifying it without buying the upgrades first?

Thanks for your time.

it shouldn't make a difference.

when you open breezehome in the CK you will see that everything (all the clutter pre-upgrade as well as the upgraded furniture) are all laid on top of each other, and are toggled by an enable parent (triggered by the upgrade dialogue in the house purchase quest)

You gotta be a little careful too, because some things get disabled the same time other things get enabled by setting the object opposite of parent. I made my own tweaked version of Breezehome, and you're more than welcome to download it and pick it apart to learn from. (Just don't modify it and release your own version of my mod, please.) But if you have any questions I'll be glad to help.

Oh yeah, do NOT delete any of the vanilla objects in there. If you look at mine, I just moved anything I didn't like or want in my house way below the floor so nobody will ever see them. One other thing I suggest is that you always test your mods with a clean save. (I keep a new save as soon as I leave Helgen for every one of my characters.) For testing Breezehome, I completed the Bleak Falls Barrow quest, went back to the Jarl and finished that part so I could buy the house. At that point I made a NEW save that I would use every time to test my edits. That way I am not taking a chance on havinf already been in the house and stuff getting saved in my save game I didn't want saved in there. So you'll probably want to save either BEFORE you buy the house, or at least outside the front door BEFORE you enter the house the first time.

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=8937

Thank you both for your help!

I especially appreciate the tips for saving and testing on a fresh save...that is kind of the info I was hoping for!

I will most likely use the file, thank you so much for sharing it.

So much to learn!

Cheers and happy modding